“Seven People Dancing”

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The New Yorker hosted a discussion about a previously unpublished Langston Hughes short story with Arnold Rampersand, who wrote a two-volume biography of the Harlem Renaissance poet, and first discovered the unpublished story thirty years ago. The story, “Seven People Dancing,” explores themes of sexuality and expression:

I think that his cruelly comic, or comically cruel, vision of humanity is at play here in a dominant way. Hughes has a measure of sympathy for his characters, but his clinical and yet satirical instinct takes over and asserts itself, in a mixture of near-bitterness and humor that speaks perhaps to a profound sense of loneliness, isolation, and possible impotence on his part.

Kelly Lynn Thomas reads, writes, and sometimes sews in Pittsburgh, PA. Her creative work has appeared in Sou’wester, Thin Air Magazine, Heavy Feather Review, metazen, and others, and she received her MFA in Creative Writing from Chatham University. She is hopelessly obsessed with Star Wars and can always be found with a large mug of tea. She also runs the very small Wild Age Press. Read more at kellylynnthomas.com. More from this author →